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On May 17, a Russian court will begin hearing Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s appeal against his latest conviction, in one of the country’s most famous and controversial cases. Once the richest person in Russia, worth $15 billion and ranked no. 15 in the world, the former head of Yukos Oil has been behind bars since 2003. That’s when he and his business partner Platon Lebedev were arrested and later convicted on fraud charges and tax evasion. They were supposed to be released this year but instead were convicted a second time in December of embezzling more than 200 million tons of oil and laundering the proceeds, adding six more years onto their time in the slammer.

To many, the two verdicts contradict one another (after all, how could he evade taxes on stolen money) and are proof that the ruling was politically motivated, a move by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to keep his political foe locked up. An aide to the judge stepped down after alleging that the judge had been pressured to issue a guilty plea.

For Khodorkovsky’s son Pavel, age 25, the December conviction and coming appeal have been a call to action and a signal for him to raise his own profile. Pavel was recently in Washington D.C. lobbying U.S. officials, congressmen and a senator. He also attended the first U.S. screening of Khodorkovsky, a documentary about his father’s life including his power struggle with Putin that first premiered at the Berlin Film Festival under dramatic circumstances; a burglar had stolen the final draft less than two weeks before its screening, forcing the director to scramble.

“I decided several months ago when it was becoming clear how the trial would go that I had to step up my role and start speaking to media and officials,” says Khodorkovsky, who founded the Institute of Modern Russia in New Jersey in February 2010. “Putin doesn’t see a way to release my father without admitting fault or defeat,” says Khodorkovsky, “Keeping him in jail makes him more powerful.”

President of the institute, whose goals include strengthening Russia’s “rule of law”, promoting democracy, and improving relationships between Russia and other nations, he is realistic about what lays ahead: “We need a miracle. But even if (my father) loses, which is 99% likely, we will continue to bring attention to his case to ensure his safety and also to improve the justice system in Russia.”

Khodorkovsky was 18 when his father was arrested on charges of fraud and tax evasion. Then a freshman at Babson College near Boston, he had just been really getting to know his dad, who was divorced from his mother and had spent much of Pavel’s childhood building his business and fortune; Pavel himself attended a Swiss boarding school for four years. But the father and son spent a lot of time together in the summer of 2003. “When I left for Boston, I knew there was a problem but it wasn’t critical,” recalls Khodorkovsky, who saw his father for the last time when he visited him at school in September 2003. A month later his father was arrested.